I don't understand why this subject is a debate. Lets look it at like scientists, not politicians. Sulfur dioxide increases cloud cover. Cloud cover makes Earth reflective, temperatures drop. Carbon dioxide converts solar radiation to UV rays and traps it in the lower atmosphere, heating the surface. That's a chemical property of carbon dioxide.........not debatable. As for the carbon cycle, CO2 concentration (parts per million) has steadily increased since 1860 (measured in geological fossils), started increasing faster in 1958. It's increased about 300 ppm in the last 150 years. The atmosphere and biosphere are in equilibrium, same with the ocean and the atmosphere. Old dead stuff makes it unbalanced, that's where greenhouse gas comes from. Greenhouse gas absorbs energy and radiates it back to the surface.

Temperature fluctuates on this planet, it always will. However, since 1800 we can see evidence of ice melting easier and winter months getting shorter. As CO2 levels rise, oceanic chemistry changes (that's usually right about when a mass extinction occurs - and there's been millions of these extinctions). As ice caps melt (don't argue, they've melted several times in the history of this planet), warm water moves along the oceanic conveyor to the north and cold water moves south. This trend leads to an ice age (happened 6 times in history). If present trends continue, Michigan will have the same climate as Florida in about 100 years.

So, logistical analysis - CO2 has chemical properties - more CO2 in atmosphere could warm planet due to it's chemical properties - Burning fossil fuels moves carbon out of geological sinks and into the atmosphere - A warming trend is evident - Temperature increases, air can hold more moisture, weather patterns change - Temperature alters the biomes - in history, biome change always lead to an extinction.

Will the world end soon? No, but everything I mentioned seems to always lead to the same place - extinction. That's why we should START concentrating on changing.

What is there to argue?

Any questions, PM me.

john coleman is no longer affiliated with the weather channel and does not speak for the organization. i rarely watch twc except to catch the local forecast. btw, nasa has been around for 50+ years. the government has kept weather data for many decades longer. foreign governments have done the same. claiming climate change is a scam is ridiculous. the earth is warming. it's a fact.

i love how the far-right claims that since the east coast of the us had record snowfall this past winter, it's proof that global warming is a scam. if it gets real cold (below 10 degrees F), does it snow? rarely. it usually snows when the temp is 20 and above. that's the norm for here in the midwest, anyway.

natas, i apologize if it seems i'm singling out you. that is not my intent. again, sorry. it slays me when people such as beck, limbaugh, palin, coulter, and the like claim the earth isn't warming. as for gore, i'm not a fan of him, either.

As I stated above, more carbon dioxide in the air allows the air to hold more moisture, leading to increased precipitation. An increase in snowfall is actually a sign on global warming.

Well...everyone can "debate" this till the planet is to far gone to save. I've been on this planet for 56 years and have seen the changes with my own 2 eyes. I don't need a politician or scientist to tell what I can see and experience for myself. And all the links and mounds of long winded findings won't make any difference. This planet is in trouble and unless people accept that all the debates won't make a difference either. So...lets just make a documentary for who or whatever inherits the planet after we're gone. Maybe they can sit and watch it and won't make the same stupid mistakes we did.

And as far as scare mongering...that's exactly what is needed...people need to be scared to death before they get off they're collective asses and do anything. Unfortunately it will more than likely be to late by then.

"It is easier for a president to tell a lie, than for a beggar to tell the truth."..."If you tell a lie enough times it becomes the truth."

The only real trouble this planet is currently in is overpopulation. A standard ecological model would require three Earths for the worlds current human population. As for pollution and climate change, a change just needs to be made for us to sustain. As technology advances, and more people become aware of what needs to happen, things can and will turn around for us. We have not met a 'survival threshold' and I'm not going to  live in fear because the world isn't perfect. I wouldn't start talking about it being "too late" because such a pessimistic view won't solve problems, it would only motivate people to give up.

WG, I hope you understand I was trying to say there isn't a topic to debate. Scare mongering may or may not help the current population but if we start taking responsibility and emphasizing priority on conservation in younger generations, humanity won't have to worry about climate change for a long time.

Green is the new beige.

The greenhouse signature is missing.

Weather balloons have scanned the skies for years, but can find no sign of the telltale "hotspot" warming pattern that greenhouse gases would leave. There's not even a hint. Something else caused the warming.

 The strongest evidence was the ice cores, but newer, more detailed data turned the theory inside out.

Instead of carbon pushing up temperatures for the last half-a-million years, temperatures have gone up before carbon dioxide levels. On average, 800 years before. This totally threw what was thought was cause and effect out the window. Something else caused the warming.

Temperatures are not rising.

Satellites circling the planet twice a day show that the world has not warmed since 2001. How many more years of NO global warming will it take? While temperatures have been flat, CO2 has been rising, BUT something else has changed the trend.  The computer models don't know what it is.

Carbon dioxide is already doing almost all the warming it can do.

Adding twice the CO2 doesn't make twice the difference. The first CO2 molecules matter a lot, but extra ones have less and less effect. In fact, carbon levels were ten times as high in the past, but the world still slipped into an ice age. Carbon today is a bit-part player.

World temperatures have fluctuated for centuries, dating back to well before Biblical times, but that has more to do with natural occurrences than anything mankind could possibly have done to the planet.... and this 'global warming' thing is a crock of shit, designed by corporations to part us from more of our money.  For example, solely based on Rudd's proposed emissions trading scheme, electricity providers here in Oz plan to increase the cost of power to consumers by 50% next month... 75% in the near future if a proposed 40% mining tax goes ahead.

Yes, mankind needs to clean up its act, but for crying out loud, don't swallow this corporate greed thing called "global warming".  There are other, more natural causes as to why the planet experiences weather fluctuations... volcanoes and earthquakes, for example.  Mother nature has and will always will have a greater impact on the planet than man... though we could do to stop cutting down one of the greatest environmental cleansers we have... the world's rainforests.

On the "it's natural" argument...

Oil spreading on certain ocean is all natural therefore its fine.

Mercury is all natural. It's a elemental!

Hemlock is natural too.

You need better arguments than "it's natural". Dinos probably thought that the rock were natural therefore fine and shouldn't be worried about.

It requires more in depth analysis than years of flying weather balloons. It's a trend, that doesn't mean it will be a constant increasing temperature. Also, read up on the signs on global warming....in a scientific journal, not the internet.

There aren't enough factors measured in this time period. We do not know enough to hypothesize about a time period with that range.

Global warming isn't just about a steadily increasing temperature. Read my original post.

Carbon dioxide has a ripple effect on other factors on the planet, which can cause a change in biomes. No one ever said the planet was going to "burn."

Temperature has never been constant on this planet.

Try talking to a scientist about it. It seems anyone will find an excuse to avoid dealing with evident problems. The chemical properties of carbon dioxide cannot be debated, as well as its correspondence to mass extinctions throughout history.

Hey no problems here!

The oil most likely would not be floating on the world's oceans if man had not interfered/dug it up/drilled for it.

And the rising mercury levels in some world rivers... that would be man's doing again, manufacturing effluent being washed into waterways.

Hemlock, was used for remedial/medicinal purposes, not just sinister ones.

The thing here is that all these natural element are largely inert if left in their natural states.  It is usually mans intervention when environmental disasters occur involving these (and other) elements.  So yes, mankind needs to clean up its act and be more 'planet friendly', but at the same time, we need truth from out governments and corporations.... and right now we're not getting it.

No point talking to scientists!   Most of them are corporate lackies being paid to do corporate bidding... to find favourably for corporate agendas/aspirations.  And many of the rest of them are eccentric peculiarities studying the mating habits of green tree frogs or some other exotic creature.

The bottom line in all this is... if corporations actually gave a shit about the planet, they'd have employed better business practices years ago... before they stuffed up the environment.  No, the truth is that most corporate big-wigs are capitalist pigs who care only about profit and getting rich quick.... amassing as much wealth as possible and bugger at what or whose expense.  This has been going on since the advent of the industrial revolution, greedy, profit-driven capitalists exploiting all and sundry, people and resources, and now that they have a few scientists on the payroll (like somebody has to employ them or the university loans never get repaid)  to prove they have/had planetary impact, the bastards want us to pay for their greed and monumental cock-ups through increased power and fuel levies.

When power and fuel goes up, so does everything else, but does anyone here honestly believe that our paying through the nose to 'so-say' fix global warming is actually going to work???  Pigs arse it will!!!!   We will pay more for less, few if any environmental measures will be implemented, and the big corporate bastards will reap hugely increased profits and run laughing all the way to the bank.

For the most part, science is based on theory and is often dis-proven and or amended later on... and I'll bet my balls this global warming thing (as is presented) will be dis-proven and revealed as being a fallacy to derive greater corporate profits.

G3mpi3

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Try talking to a scientist about it. It seems anyone will find an excuse to avoid dealing with evident problems. The chemical properties of carbon dioxide cannot be debated, as well as its correspondence to mass extinctions throughout history.

Climatologist, author, former NASA scientist.....  http://www.drroyspencer.com/

Thanks.

First of all, it's naive to think scientists will ever agree on one subject. Second, it seems he and I agree about a lot of things. Yes, climate change is a natural process.....I pointed that out in my first post. I'm just saying we're accelerating the process, when we should be concentrating on slowing it down. Temperature isn't the important outcome of global warming, it's all of the other effects that I stated before. Yes, carbon dioxide is slowly increasing, and it would appear that one extra particle per 100,000 isn't statistically important, However, in science we know small things can have huge side effects. For example, one drop of Clostridium botulinum is potent enough to kill thousands of people. There's really no excuse for not being more responsible when it comes to taking care of the environment.

Maximising space. a solution.